


Traces of the Dead

by orphan_account



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Ableist Language, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Background Relationships, Gen, R plus L equals J, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-01
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-09 22:52:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11678769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Barristan Selmy goes with the king to Winterfell, hoping to find Ashara Dayne in the face of her rumored son. Instead he finds Rhaegar Targaryen.





	Traces of the Dead

The Lord Commander of the Kingsguard was supposed to remain behind in King’s Landing with Robert's other councilors, but Ser Barristan Selmy had insisted upon accompanying the royal party north.

“My place is with my king,” he had said.

 _I want to see Jon Snow with my own eyes and discover whether he is truly Ashara Dayne’s son as the rumors say,_ he had not.

“Words are wind,” his father had told him as a child, but in his old age Barristan ignored his father's advice. He listened avidly to every rumor about Ashara’s demise there was. They filled him with a sick grief that nothing else equaled, not even his memories of the Stepstones or the Battle of the Trident, yet he had heard them.

He had needed to hear them.

Barristan horded the stories like a dragon from the songs, and he would not deny himself the chance to look upon Ashara’s son with his own eyes, if the Bastard of Winterfell were in truth her child.

There were other rumors about Jon Snow’s parentage, but Barristan remembered those less well. Fishermen’s daughters and camp followers, women to whom he paid no heed.

Ashara had been the only woman to ever catch his eye. Not even the lady who was almost his bride had earned his wholehearted attention, and she had been as sweet and pretty as any maid.

Ashara had been something else. Her son should be too.

Barristan wished to see Jon Snow with a blade in his hand more than anything else. There was no greater delight than to watch a skilled swordsman practice, and Barristan had been denied that pleasure ever since Ser Arthur’s death.

(He would not watch the Kingslayer spar.)

If the boy _were_ the nephew of the Sword of the Morning and the son of the man who killed him, then he should be a sight to behold, even at his tender age.

But Barristan did not see the boy when the Starks welcomed the royal party to Winterfell. He wondered whether he would see him at all, and his panic at such a thought disgraced him, though no one but he would ever know.

Fortunately, at the feast that night, Benjen Stark stood and went to speak with someone sitting among the squires. Even at a distance Barristan could recognize the dark hair and long face of a Stark.

Standing side by side, Lord Benjen and Jon Snow looked enough alike to be father and son themselves.

Their conversation began with the easy familiarity of family but soon devolved until the argument drew the attention of others seated near the boy. No one else seated at the high table noticed.

With a final tilt, the boy fled the hall.

Barristan was not on duty to the king, and Lord Bran’s questions had all been answered, concluding his duty to his hosts. He excused himself as soon as he could and followed the boy outside.

He crossed paths with Tyrion Lannister as he went, and the Imp said, “I do not think he is in a mood to discuss rumors about his parentage, ser,” in an almost kind way.

“I had no intention of doing so, my lord,” Barristan retorted. Honesty compelled him to add, “I want to see him spar.”

“ _That_ he might be in the mood to do.”

Sure enough, he found Jon Snow with a blunted blade in hand, running through drills with an intensity that would see him injured if he kept it up. His footwork was excellent, however, and his accuracy and strength were impressive.

Jon Snow was good for his age, but Ser Arthur had been _good._ Barristan had been, too.

“You should be more careful. You might cause yourself harm.”

It frightened the boy to hear a voice from the darkness, and the flickering torchlight surely did Barristan no favors. The blade fell to the ground (a clumsy, amateur mistake), and the boy’s eyes widened. “Ser Barristan Selmy,” the boy breathed. He bowed.

Barristan returned the bow.

In the shadow and light Barristan searched for any sign of Ashara Dayne in this son of Winterfell, but Jon Snow was as much a Stark as his father and uncle. His cheekbones were higher, perhaps, his chin more pointed, and his face less narrow, though Barristan could blame that on youth if not for his slender frame. And he _was_ slender, far more lean than Barristan could remember any Stark being.

“How old are you?” he asked. He hoped the brusqueness in his voice would be blamed on his age or his status, but the boy was accustomed to brusque manners. Bastards often were.

“Fourteen, my lord,” the boy answered.

Barristan almost sighed aloud. He was too young. Ashara’s child would be fifteen, nearly sixteen.

He wished to storm off and mourn his loss all over again, but his courtesies were too refined for him to abandon the conversation. "You are a fine sword,” he said.

“Better than Robb.”

The boast emerged from the boy's mouth suddenly, perhaps unintentionally. Barristan could feel the heat of his blush from where he stood. He had missed the boasts of good young men, eager to prove themselves but embarrassed by their eagerness, not the empty threats and posturing of Prince Joffrey.

He laughed. “It is good for young men to challenge each other,” he assured Jon Snow. “My cousin and I were of age with each other, and we often sparred in the hope that one might prove himself the better swordsman.”

The boy grinned. “I’d bet you won.”

“I suppose I did.” His cousin was long dead, and so was the bride he had married in Barristan’s stead. “Yet it was a long time in the making. Swordplay is a lifelong discipline, not something that one can, or should, pick up with ease.” The boy nodded with such earnestness that Barristan added, “But you are very good. Few boys are as talented at your age as you are now.”

The boy tilted his face downwards, shyly, and Barristan’s heart stopped. It lasted only a split second, and he might not have noticed if it were not for the way the shadow and light played upon Jon Snow’s face, but by the gods, he saw _Rhaegar_ in this boy for an instant _._ Rhaegar had outgrown those moments of shyness (or more likely introversion, for the prince had not been _shy_ ) as he grew up, but he still had done it when he was fourteen. Jon Snow had looked exactly like Rhaegar then when the dark of the night made the color of his hair and eyes uncertain and the torchlight highlighted the lines of his face.

No one else would have noticed it. No one else who knew Rhaegar as well as Barristan had (and even he had not known him _well_ ) would seek out Jon Snow in the middle of a feast and search for traces of the dead in his face.

Suddenly old mysteries were solved... why Rhaegar had left three knights of the Kingsguard with Lyanna Stark, why they had died for her, and how the lady herself had died.

Barristan, though injured and on bedrest at the time, had noticed how Ned Stark had kept his bastard and his wet nurse hidden away during his brief stop in King’s Landing on his way northwards with Lyanna Stark’s bones. He had believed Lord Stark's secrecy went hand and hand with shame, but now he suspected otherwise.

Had he feared that Jon would meet the same fate as Rhaenys and Aegon? Barristan could not blame him if he had — or if he still did.

The boy was a prince, the last dragon... if Jon Snow were the trueborn son of Rhaegar Targaryen, and not his bastard. The Targaryens had abandoned polygamy centuries ago, but Rhaegar might have resurrected the custom rather than shame the well-loved daughter of House Stark.

“My lord?” Jon asked uncertainly.

Barristan had been still and silent too long, and he was an old man. _The boy probably thought I was dead or dying._ He shook his head and said, “Forgive me. For a moment you reminded me of a friend who died during the Rebellion.”

Jon's expression was torn between curiosity and dismay. Barristan had fought for the Targaryens in Robert’s Rebellion, and he did not want to be compared to a dead man who had fought for the monster of his childhood nightmares.

He could not know that Aerys was his grandfather, not yet. A child might speak a secret unthinkingly, and Stark would not allow his nephew to endanger himself after risking so much to keep him alive.

Stark surely meant to tell him when he was a man grown, but how could he do so now if he were in the south serving Robert while Jon Snow remained in the North? To do so when the king and countless unfriendly ears were in Winterfell was the height of folly, and obviously he had not told him while the king was on his way north either.

_What is your plan, Lord Stark? Do you even have one?_

Barristan struggled to find something else to say. “Are you joining your lord father in King’s Landing?” he asked.

Jon stood taller and prouder. “No, ser. I am joining the Night’s Watch.”

 _“You cannot!”_ he almost shouted, but he had more sense than that. He could not stop Jon, not without involving Stark, and Stark would suspect Barristan’s motives hereafter if he wanted to prevent a son of Rhaegar Targaryen from taking the black. He would think that Barristan wanted a Targaryen restoration.

And didn’t he? His thoughts had often turned to Aegon V and Jaehaerys II, even the Prince of Dragonflies, these past few years as Robert grew weak and fat and the threat of Joffrey on the throne grew greater. Mere minutes in Jon Snow’s presence, and he was prepared to declare him a better prince than the present heir to the Iron Throne.

“Like your uncle,” he said instead. _Both Benjen and Aemon, and doubtless other Stark uncles more distant._

Jon looked, if anything, prouder. “Yes, ser. My uncle Benjen is First Ranger.”

_No, come south as my squire. No, go to Essos and find your aunt and uncle. No, stay here, and I will send you word when it is time for you to rise._

_Yes, if you must, but go to Maester Aemon the second you arrive and tell him who you are. Tell him the gods are not cruel enough to rob him of all his family._

“I wish you good fortune, Jon Snow. I have no doubt that you will serve the Night’s Watch with distinction.”

**Author's Note:**

> There are a lot of stories where someone figures out R+L=J on flimsy evidence, but I couldn't find one where Barristan does! It was an outrage, so I wrote it myself.
> 
> If you're wondering what happens next, this universe follows canon until Barristan is dismissed from the Kingsguard. He goes to the Wall instead of joining Dany, and he takes the black after learning Jon already swore his vows.


End file.
